


Love is Light

by SpaceWaffleHouseTM



Series: One Shots from the Waffle House [30]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bisexuality, Demi/Bi Ben, Demisexuality, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Mild Angst, No Pregnancy, Reunited and It Feels So Good, Rugby, Trans!Rey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:54:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24665689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceWaffleHouseTM/pseuds/SpaceWaffleHouseTM
Summary: When he was a freshman, Ben developed feelings for one of the guys in his rugby team but he hid it. They lost touch and he was heartbroken. Fast forward to senior year, he meets a girl that reminds him of Rey but doesn't know itisRey.Maybe he takes her out on a date once he realizes who she is and maybe there’s a lot of blue flowers involved.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: One Shots from the Waffle House [30]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1298357
Comments: 43
Kudos: 152
Collections: A Rey by Any Other Name, Queerly Beloved Reylo Fics, Reylo Prompt Fills (@reylo_prompts)





	Love is Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [frak-all (or_ryn)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/or_ryn/gifts).



> I saw this moodboard by frakall, and I knew I wanted to do it, but wasn't sure what I would do until I saw the prompt on twitter and I KNEW
> 
> Quote on moodboard is by Simone Weil

Moonlight sheathes everything in shades of blue, Ben’s noticed. Blue and silver, as if the entire world has become the surface of an ocean with the night, and he sees this clearly in the flowers that cover the meadow he’s come upon. 

It’s a stunningly beautiful thing, the flowers and a moon surrounded by stars, the perfect place to just admire, to commemorate in art, or even to fall in love. He’s certainly come here for at least one of those things. 

As he passes through the trees into the flowers, he holds out his hand for the girl he’s brought with him, her fingers wrapping around his as he guides her over a tree root, and a tiny hint of pink colors her cheeks amidst the blue, and he finds his heart fluttering in his chest all over again. “What do you think?” he asks. 

“Ben, it’s beautiful,” she replies, her usually deep voice a pitchy whisper as she steps out onto the flower coated grass with him. “I love it.”

He wants to repeat that sentence and change the last word, but for now, he refrains. He wants to wait until they’re properly beneath the stars, until the moment is exactly right to tell the only person he has ever loved that he loves her. 

When he’d first met Rey, they were on the boys rugby team in freshman year. He was the captain and she was his co-captain, only back then she had short hair and everyone assumed her gender matched the one she’d been assigned at birth. He’d been in love with her from virtually the moment they met, even if he didn’t know what love was. Before he met her, he’d never had a crush, never had a single inkling that he could be into  _ anyone _ , but that year they spent together captaining the rugby team?

Everyday had felt like flying, as if he could never come back down, and he’d been so scared to tell her he loved her, but then when the year ended and he told her, he tacked on “you’re my best friend,” at the end of it and left it at that. 

When Rey moved at the beginning of summer that year, he was devastated that he had no way of contacting her, and he resigned himself to knowing he would never get her back. 

That all changed when a girl with the same name, just with an E instead of an A, moved to town at the start of his senior year. It took a few weeks and a lot of catching up, but he became sure within hours that Rey was the person he’d been in love with for three years. Somehow, he’d been fortunate enough to find that she hadn’t found anyone else, and he wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice. 

He’d found the one person he’d ever wanted to be with, and he wasn’t going to miss another opportunity to be with her. He asked her to go out with him Monday after the final bell rang, and now here they are on Friday night, both walking out into the flowerbed with their fingers laced. 

Once they’re in the center of the moonlight, he stops, then sits down, holding her hand all the while as she stares at him in confusion. “What are you doing?”

“Lie down with me.”

“What?”

“Lie down with me,” he repeats. “I—I’ve been wanting to do this for three years.”

She smiles as she joins him, giggling softly as he scoops her into his arms, closing his eyes at the overwhelming feeling of comfort this gives him. Normally he doesn’t like contact with other people, even his parents are hard pressed to get a hug from him, but with Rey it’s like breathing. The connection they’d built three years earlier was still as strong and bold as the day it had been forged. 

When her head nuzzles beneath his chin, he tilts his toward the sky, thanking all of the stars in it that he got this second chance, and plucks a flower, holding the blue petals in front of her with another shy smile parting his lips. “Can I interest you in a flower?”

“Of course,” she replies, then he bites his lip, and before he can lose his nerve, he tucks it in her ear, adjusting her hair behind the bud so that those petals are visible beneath the pretty brunette waves she’s grown out since the last time he saw her. “Thank you.”

“I know I’ve said this a million times at school, but I really missed you.”

“I missed you, too,” she says, then she’s cupping his cheek, her palm smelling distinctly of flowers and mist from the humid air. “I’m sorry I left.”

“Rey…”

“I didn’t want to leave you, but I was dealing with a lot of shit back then, and—“

“You don’t have to explain this if you don’t want to.”

“Ben, I want to,” she promises him, then she leans forward, shocking his entire body to life as she presses a tender, short, and sweet kiss to his lips. 

It’s his first kiss, and never in a million years did he ever think he’d experience such a head rush. There’s this weird, fluttering feeling in his stomach, he thinks it might be what people call butterflies, but he’s not sure. All he knows is that it feels right in a way nothing has before. For years he’d been the only kid in class who’d never kissed anyone, and sometimes it had felt weird, felt alienating, and he maybe could’ve gone his whole life happily having never kissed anyone, but kissing Rey feels incredible. 

Then she pulls away, giving him a shy smile as she strokes the smooth skin of his cheek. “My foster mother wanted me to have a fresh start somewhere else, so we moved away for a couple of years, but even though I finally started to feel comfortable in my own skin, I just…” She sniffles, and for a moment he’s worried that she’s about to cry, but then she composes herself. “I wasn’t happy. I think Maz saw right through me.”

“I always did think she was a little psychic,” he says, then they both laugh as he plucks another flower from the ground, putting this one behind her other ear as her cheeks break the blue landscape with their pink once more. “But you—are you saying you came back here for me?”

“You’re not the only one who regrets not saying something when you had the chance.”

“That’s why I brought you here tonight, to right the wrong I committed before we parted ways,” he says, and this time  _ his _ palm rests on  _ her _ cheek. “I-I-you know I’ve never felt this way about anyone else.”

“I know.”

"Rey?”

“I feel the same way, you should know I always have.”

“Nothing’s changed?”

“Nothing’s changed.” She smiles at him again, the sun and the moon together for the first time. “Except, I kind of want to ask you to be my boyfriend, and I kind of want you to say yes.”

His laughter shakes them for a moment, then he nods. “Yeah, I kind of want to be your boyfriend, too.”

There’s one more giggle from her, then she’s kissing him again, her lips caressing his as he pulls her in close, fingers stroking her hair as he breathes her in, the scent of flowers and something unmistakably  _ Rey  _ filling his senses as they finally begin to heal from their prolonged separation. Their second kiss is just as good as their first, only this one actually manages to make him dizzy as it steals the breath from his lungs.

It’s the happiest he’s ever been, fireworks filling his vision as they lay back against the sea of blue petals, and together, they lose themselves to the sweetness of this kiss. The past was painful, time passed agonizingly slowly without her in his life, and now that she’s back, he knows he will never let her go. They have college in a year, sure, and odds are the same school won’t fit him  _ and _ her, but he thinks they’ve at least become fortunate enough that they’ll know how to keep in touch if they do separate again. 

He’s no longer scared of what comes next. His heart has found its home, and he’s finally free to love the only soul he’s ever loved. All he can hope for now is that she likes going to movies and coming to lay in the flowers on her Friday nights, that they can do this again and again until their time runs out. 

If he can get that tiny little slice of time with her, he thinks that maybe, just maybe, everything they’ve been through will have been worth it. 


End file.
